GOLDEN PEN AWARD-TODAYS WINNER IS JEROME MAN,WHO LIVES IN SAN JUAN
CAPISTRANO.

I am a 75-year-old, terminally ill cancer patient on a hospice program at
Saddleback hospital. (By the way,these people at Saddleback should be
designated as national treasures.)

One of the best drugs with the fewest side-effects for cancer patients is
marijuana. Marijuana reduces the extreme nausea and retching that often
accompanies terminal cancer.

It also improves the lack of appetite. In short, it lets cancer patients
live longer and more comfortably.

Doctors, nurses, cancer patients and their families know this. Legislators
apparently do not.

Our legislators have made it illegal for doctors to prescribe this drug
although it has been consistently shown to be one of the best treatments
available.

They are meddling in medical science to the detriment of my health and the
health and well being of millions of cancer patients.

When a member of your family is in the end stages of cancer, finding relief
and comfort for them goes beyond the capricious legal system.

Yet, it is infinitely sad that one's choice in this matter is to either
break the law or, for some of us, terminate our own life.

Doctors can prescribe heavy duty narcotics like morphine, codeine and the
like. For many of us, these drugs leave us comatose, unable to function.
Marijuana does not have this type of side-effect.

Legislators have to make the laws, but where cancer is concerned only those
legislators with cancer should be permitted to make those laws.

Checked-by: Pat Dolan